All about the United Kingdom’s national, regional and local press

Shropshire Star

10 September 2013

The Shropshire Star is an evening newspaper published in several editions and sold across the county of Shropshire and neighbouring parts of Mid-Wales. It covers both the major towns of Shrewsbury and Telford, smaller towns around the county and their surrounding villages, as well as most of northern Powys and southern Denbighshire across the Welsh border.

It’s published by Shropshire Newspapers, a division of Wolverhampton-based Midland News Association, from their headquarters in Ketley in Telford. It boasts a history of technological innovation, starting from its launch in 1964 when it became the first evening newspaper in Europe to be printed by web-offset. (It took over from the Shropshire edition of the Express & Star.)

Midland News Association introduced a part-paywall on the Shropshire Star‘s website in April 2011, under which photo galleries, match analysis and real-time traffic and travel information would be available only on the premium website and via an iPhone/iPad app. Edited highlights of breaking news stories remained free. The move also affected the Star‘s sister paper, the Express & Star. However, the paywall was abandoned after nine months.

It used to come out in no fewer than eight editions every day from Monday to Friday:

Midday – the early edition

Oswestry – for North West Shropshire and the Llangollen area)

Mid Wales – for Welshpool (Y Trallwng) and Newtown

North – for Whitchurch and Market Drayton

Bridgnorth – for South East Shropshire

South – for Ludlow, Church Stretton, Bishop’s Castle, Clun, Tenbury Wells and Much Wenlock

Shrewsbury – also for the surrounding villages

Last – the final edition for Telford, Newport, Shifnal and Albrighton

However, by the end of 2011 the number of Mon-Fri issues had been reduced to five (Border, County, South, Shrewsbury and Last). Technical problems at the Ketley printworks in the spring of 2012 meant that the number of issues had to be reduced to just two, County and Last, a move which was made permanent at the end of May 2012; the Shrewsbury edition has since been revived. The Last edition is published at 1500, which the Star claims is the latest deadline in the country.

The Saturday edition was and is a bumper Weekend edition, although it doubled in size in April 2013 from 40 to 80 pages.

The Star‘s also available online as an e-edition by paid subscription.